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Calls grow to decriminalise sex work

HIV will not be beaten unless there is a dramatic improvement in the
services provided to sex workers — a development that may be made
possible only by decriminalising the profession, say top South African
researchers as the world’s biggest AIDS conference gets under way this
week in Melbourne, Australia.

In a special series on HIV and sex workers published by the Lancet on
Tuesday, South African researchers estimate that half of South Africa’s
150,000 female sex workers are HIV-positive.

"We are not going to overcome the epidemic unless we turn our
attention to key affected populations," said Linda-Gail Bekker,
co-director of the University of Cape Town’s Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation
and co-author of two papers and a commentary published in the Lancet.

Prof Bekker and her colleagues calculated that South African
programmes promoting condom use had already reduced HIV incidence by 70%
among female sex workers and their clients, and estimated this could be
reduced by another 40% over 10 years if sex workers had access to
preventative medication and early treatment.